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Friday, 29 April 2016

I’m sure you’ve all seen
the illusion below before. It’s a duck’s head. Or is it a rabbit’s head? It has been
reproduced in so many books and magazine, even since it first appeared in 1892.

But how does this illusion
help us to understand the philosophical ideas about reality, interpretation and
language?The duck-rabbit was used
by the gay philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein (1889-1951) to illustrate just that.
Basically, what he said was that the duck-rabbit can be interpreted in the mind
as two different things – a rabbit or a duck – but never as both. To do so
would mean coming up with a new interpretation of the image in our mind that is
neither, a new image called a duck-rabbit. All we are doing by using the new
name “duck-rabbit” is creating a new way to describe it, but the image itself
hasn’t changed.Until “duck”, “rabbit” and
“duck-rabbit” can all define the image perfectly, none of them can. So,
according to Wittgenstein, it is pointless trying to describe it at all. That’s
what he originally believed about philosophy itself. It can’t be described
perfectly, so that it encompasses all philosophical beliefs. That means there’s
no point in philosophising. Yes, he talked himself out of his own job! Later he
modified his views to concentrate on language and logic.Wittgenstein said that
that some sentences can be interpreted differently at different times by
different people in different circumstances, just like the duck-rabbit can be
interpreted differently. He used the duck-rabbit image to represent
philosophical concepts such as consciousness, morality, justice and equality.
Our mind interprets these differently depending on the context in which we use
them. For instance, justice for some may be vigilantism to others, depending on
the context. Neither is adequate to define justice with ultimate precision.In another little puzzle
Wittgenstein asks us to imagine a group of people carrying one box each. Inside
each closed box is an object which the carrier refers to as a beetle. But how
do we know that each person uses the word “beetle” to describe what is in
everyone else’s box? Only a common consensus on the definition of “beetle”
which agrees with what is contained in their own box can make them all say that
they all have beetles in their boxes, even if they can’t see them. Once the
definition of “beetle” has been agreed they can all imagine a beetle in every
box.Wittgenstein used these
language-games, as they are called, and others, to explain how he believed
concepts cannot be described if there are no precise words to describe them. He
emphasised the role of context. If I say “rose” you’ll immediately imagine
something in your mind which you perceive as “rose”. Is it the same thing as I
am imagining? Without knowing what context I imagine “rose” to be it is
impossible for everyone to know what I mean. Actually, “rose” is the colour of
the table-top I’m sitting at as I write this. Were you right? Wittgenstein
would say that it doesn’t matter whether what you imagined was the same as
mine, because your definition is still correct as far as you perceive it.Language-games are the
stock in trade of comedy, and thanks to Wittgenstein we realise how good jokes
work. In the end it doesn’t matter, for example, if the duck-rabbit is just a
duck or just a rabbit. The concept behind comedy, particularly double-entendres
and puns, is that we perceive jokes differently in different contexts. Unlike
Wittgenstein’s early views on philosophy, we can define the joke to make it
understandable to all.This leads me on to one of
the classic sketches in British comedy. In fact, it was voted the best comedy
sketch of all time by BBC viewers. It explains Wittgenstein well in that it
displays how our perception and definition shifts as the context of the words
change. This sketch may be difficult to understand if English isn’t your
primary language. But that in itself explains Wittgenstein. Comedy, like
philosophy, only works if there is a universally accepted logic behind the use
of words.This sketch pays tribute
to one of the men in it. Ronnie Corbett, one of the UK’s greatest and
best-loved comedy actors died recently and was buried last month. He’s the
shopkeeper in this sketch. The other man is another much-missed comedy great,
Ronnie Barker, who wrote this sketch.

Tuesday, 26 April 2016

We’re coming to the end of
the Jewish festival of Passover right now, so today we look at lgbt Jewish
culture. Perhaps more than any other faith Judaism has become a form of secular
cultural identity. Many Jews don’t think of themselves as having any belief at
all but embrace their Jewish ancestry and heritage with pride.As with other faiths there
is a multitude of different denominations within Judaism with different
doctrinal attitudes to the lgbt community. These differences range for the
Orthodox Jewish opinion based on the much-quoted and even greater
misinterpreted scriptural verse, as it is with extreme Christian groups, from Leviticus.
The verse was translated into English many centuries ago as “do not lie with a
man as you would with a woman, since this is an abomination”. Many extreme
believers and atheists alike have misinterpreted, often deliberately to justify
their bigotry, the word “abomination” which doesn’t even appear in the original
scriptural texts.While the debate about
ordaining lgbt clergy is still going on in many faiths Judaism in one of the
first to appoint openly lgbt clergy of all genders. Needless to say, it is in
the newer, more liberal denominations that this has occurred. The traditional
Orthodox Jewish denomination does not ordain openly lgbt rabbis though some
have come out after ordination.

Among the first achieved
by lgbt rabbis are the following, arranged by denomination.ORTHODOX
JUDAISM1999(USA)
Rabbi Steven Greenberg comes out, the person most often referred to as the
first openly gay Orthodox rabbi.

2011(USA)
Rachel Isaacs, the first open lgbt woman to be ordained a Conservative rabbi.2014(USA)
Mikie Goldstein, the first openly lgbt man to be ordained a Conservative rabbi.REFORM
JUDAISM1981(UK)
Rabbi Lionel Blue comes out, the first openly lgbt Reform rabbi.1984(UK)
Sheila Shulman and Elizabeth Tilvah Sarah, both openly lgbt, ordained as Reform
rabbis.2006(USA)
Elliot Kukla, the first transgendered rabbi of Reform Judaism.2014(USA) Rabbi Denise Eger, the first openly
lgbt President of a Reform conference.RESTRUCTIONIST
JUDAISM

1985(USA)
Deborah Brin, the first openly lgbt to be ordained a Restructionist rabbi.

2007(USA)
Rabbi Toba Spitzer, the first openly lgbt President of a rabbinical
association.

2013(USA)
Rabbi Jason Klein, the openly lgbt male President of a rabbinical association.

RENEWAL
JUDAISM

2005(USA)
Eli Cohen, the first openly lgbt man to be ordained a Renewal rabbi.

2006(USA)
Chaya Eisfield and Lori Klien, the first openly lgbt to be ordained Renewal
rabbis.

As a prelude to an article
I’ll publish next month, there is also a Jewish humanist movement. It was
founded in 1963 by Rabbi Sherwin Wine (1928-2007) and is the only major Jewish
denomination founded by an openly gay man. Humanist Judaism is not specifically
an lgbt denomination but is the most lgbt-friendly of all of them. Although a
non-religious organisation it still uses the title of rabbi for its leaders and
teachers.

There are many other lgbt
Jewish religious and secular organisations and a list of them can be found on
the JQ International website here.

Saturday, 23 April 2016

It’s one of those quirky
synchronistic facts that would be difficult to believe if it appeared in a work
of fiction, but today we celebrate both the birthday and death of William
Shakespeare. What makes it even more quirky is that he was born (as far as we
can determine) and died on the national saint’s day of the country in which he
lived, the feast day of St. George of England (the UK is still the only country
in the world that doesn’t celebrate it’s national day with a public holiday).On several occasions I’ve
written about Shakespeare, particularly here where I explain why I don’t
believe any theory that he might have been lgbt. Here I looked at the coat of
arms of one of his lgbt namesakes and possible relatives. Today we look at a
Shakespearean character and actor.Many actors have made their
names and reputations playing Shakespearean roles. Such great lgbt actors as
Lord Olivier, Sir John Gielgud, Sir Ian McKellen and Fiona Shaw have all
received plaudits for their roles as leading Shakespearean characters. On a
little quirky sideline here, the name Hamlet is forever associated with Shakespeare,
but it is an actual name. One of my ancestors was called Hamlet Marshall who
was 8 years old when Shakespeare died, and there were others in the family
called Hamlet.In my “Around the World in
80 Gays” series I wrote about Shakespeare’s first tragedy “Titus Andronicus”
and how it influenced the modern genre of slasher films. While Titus Andronicus
is still a relatively unknown character to most people another is very well known,
Romeo.Just like my “80 Gays”
series I’m pulling several different elements together to connect “Romeo and
Juliet” with Nottingham and an American actress.Charlotte Cushman (1816-1876)
was one of the most celebrated actresses of her time. As you can see, this is
her bicentenary year. In 1845 Charlotte began appearing in “Romeo and Juliet” in
London and later went on a national tour, which included two nights in
Nottingham in February 1847. Below is the actual bill that was posted up at the
theatre. You may not notice it as first, but look who’s playing Romeo. It’s
Charlotte Cushman herself. Playing Juliet was her younger sister Susan.

Women taking the leading
male Shakespearean role isn’t new. Some recent female actors have played male
leads, most notably Fiona Shaw as King Richard II. But even Charlotte wasn’t
doing anything new. Sarah Siddons played Hamlet in the 1770s but it was well
received. Charlotte Cushman, however, made a huge step forward by not playing a
tragedic character. Audiences were more receptive to a woman in a romantic lead,
even though Romeo dies in the end. A love story was more acceptable.Charlotte’s vocal talents
helped her to be convincing. She had a wide vocal range, and her “unfeminine
appearance”, as one Shakespearean historian puts it, made her portrayal of Romeo
very convincing and it was a smash hit. It is said that she brought the
character out of its then portrayal as a young love-besotted sop into a more
heroic and tragic young man. In a way Charlotte Cushman made it possible for
Leonardo di Caprio to portray Romeo without dragging the character down to the
level of a soppy drip of a teenager.A few years later
Charlotte followed Sarah Siddons’ lead and took on the role of Hamlet, and her
final role was as Lady Macbeth, the role which made her famous in the 1830s.
Throughout her life Charlotte sought female companionship, and her last
partner, the sculptor Emma Stebbins, looked after her in her finals years of
illness.With celebrations around
the UK to commemorate Shakespeare’s 400th anniversary there seems to
be no end to the popularity of England’s premier playwright, and even if most
people never read a Shakespeare play his characters remain in our cultural consciousness
and will continue to inspire artists, actors and film-makers for generations
ahead.

Wednesday, 20 April 2016

Team LGBT has been
remarkably successful at the Olympic Games (I’ll deal with the Paralympics in a
separate article in June). Considering my list of lgbt athletes (as of today's date) now numbers 224
that is a small number compared to the 128,420 Olympians (excluding the Youth Olympics)
listed by the International Olympic Committee.

The full list of lgbt
medallists, which will be made available on the opening day of Rio 2016, is
long, much too long to reproduce in full today, but to give you an idea of how
successful they are, out of the 224 listed Olympians 113 have won at least one
medal. That’s over half of them! And of those 113 medallists 44 have won more than
one.

Between them the 44 multi-medallists
have 131 medals in total. Almost a third of these were won by 15 Winter
Olympians. Again, there isn’t room to list them all today, so here are the Top Ten
Medal Winners.

Name

Gold

Silver

Bronze

Total

1

Ian Thorpe

5

3

1

9

2

Ireen Wüst

4

3

1

8

3

Karin Büttner-Janz

2

3

2

7

4

Anja Pärson

1

1

4

6

5=

Greg Louganis

4

1

0

5

5=

Jayna Hefford

4

1

0

5

7

Marnie McBean

3

1

0

4

8=

Daniel Kowalski

1

1

2

4

8=

Blyth Tait

1

1

2

4

10

Robert Dover

0

0

4

4

NOTE: This table counts the total number of
medals won by each athlete. Other 10 athletes have won 2 gold medals each. I haven’t
placed them higher than Pärson, Kowalski, Tait and Dover because they won fewer
medals than those four overall. The top 6 multi-gold-winning lgbt champions all make it into the
top 10.

Since the early years of the modern Olympics all top 8 finishers in every
event have received Olympic Diplomas. The top 3, of course, also win gold,
silver or bronze medals. Only 60, just over a quarter of the 224 lgbt Olympians,
have not placed higher than 9th position. The following table shows
how many lgbt Olympians have finished in the top 8 and received Diplomas.

Gold

Silver

Bronze

4th

5th

6th

7th

8th

83

60

61

27

27

37

19

16

What we can see
immediately is that most lgbt athletes have achieved the top placings. The
figure of 83 Olympic champions in a group of 224 is phenomenal. It would seem
natural to expect larger numbers in the lower placings, but you can see that
when it comes to top places lgbt athletes are very successful. A similar
analysis of non-lgbt-identified Olympians would be a major task considering how
many thousands of them there have been, so I don’t want to make any comparisons.

But which nation has won
the most medals? Of course, the nation with the most athletes is likely to come
top. Generally speaking, that is exactly what we find. Below is a table of the top
10 lgbt medal placings according to nation.

Nation

Gold

Silver

Bronze

Total

1

USA

29

11

11

51

2

Canada

13

8

6

27

3

Netherlands

10

10

11

27

4

Australia

10

12

4

26

5

Germany (including East &
West)

3

8

1

11

6

Norway

4

1

4

9

7

Great Britain

3

0

4

7

8

Denmark

6

0

0

6

9

Sweden

1

3

2

6

10=

Poland

2

1

1

4

10=

Czechoslovakia/Republic

1

2

1

4

10=

New Zealand

1

1

2

4

Now, the top 10 medal
placings arranged by sport.

Sport

Gold

Silver

Bronze

Total

1

swimming

8

6

6

20

2

ice hockey

9

5

4

18

3

track & field

8

7

3

18

4

football

7

0

10

17

5

equestrianism

2

3

11

16

6

hockey

8

1

5

14

7

speed skating

5

6

1

12

8

figure skating

3

4

3

10

9

handball

8

0

1

9

10

diving

5

2

2

9

NOTE: I place ice hockey higher than track
and field because more gold medals were won. Likewise with handball and diving.

There is further analysis
according to team and individual events, but I’ll leave that for another time.
Analysis of medals won by athletes who were openly lgbt compared to those who
weren’t is more difficult because of incomplete information of when some
athletes came out.

I hope all the
number-crunching hasn’t been too much of a statistical overload. I know for a
fact that these statistics will change before the end of Rio 2016 as more lgbt
Olympians compete and more are identified.

More number-crunching next
time, I’m afraid, when I number-crunch the numbers of lgbt competitors at individual
games, and I take a trip down memory lane.

About Me

I was born during a thunderstorm in the summer of 1960 and was brought up in a village in north Nottinghamshire. I attended the sort of school which practiced “history for girls, geography for boys”, but developed a love of history none-the-less.